


The Steps

by catalinawinemixer



Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Fantasy, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-10-23
Updated: 2012-10-23
Packaged: 2017-11-16 21:16:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,084
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/543895
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/catalinawinemixer/pseuds/catalinawinemixer
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Rose Tyler meets John Noble. Again and again.</p><p>for the then_theres_us ficathon on livejournal, prompted by 365challenge: Thriller/Mystery/Horror (any of those or a mixture of all)</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Steps

Rose Tyler led a very simple life.

She woke up, ate breakfast, and bussed over to the shop she managed. The monotony of her day was broken up by the occasional phone call from her mother or Mickey. She went home, and fell asleep to the sounds of the telly.

She made no motions to make her life better. She has scars on her wrists and pounding in her head and somehow, she keeps going.

The highlight of her week is always her Saturday afternoon. She takes a half day from work and ventures across the bridge to the steps. They are cobblestone and twisting and horrible on her ankles and she loves them, loves the flowers that surrounded the walkway and the constant fog that thickly layers the whole area. She packs herself a picnic lunch and works her way to the top.

That was where she saw him for the first time.

He must have been a professor of some sort. He was sprawled on the steps, all sweater vest and thick rimmed glasses. She nearly tripped right over him and he started, dropping his book at her feet.

“Oh! I’m sorry, miss.”

His thick brogue curled somewhere into the depths of her stomach. He smiled at her and she was nearly overwhelmed by the urge to slide her hands into his (already quite mussed) hair.

She shook herself. “I, uhm. Sorry. I didn’t see you there. Lost in thought.”

“Must’ve been good ones.” His grin widened. He scrambled to his feet. “I’m being terribly rude. I’m John, John Noble.”

She couldn’t help herself. “Is that Professor or Doctor Noble?”

He furrowed his brow at her. “What’s that?”

Rose felt rather like she had dribbled something down the front of her shirt. “I just- sweater vest and all. Don’t really see that look except in academia.”

He looked bemused. “Fair point.”

She swallowed, hard. “I’m Rose. Rose Tyler.”

“Well, Miss Tyler. Lovely to meet you.”

They stood there awkwardly for a moment. She couldn’t compel herself to leave him and his brogue and his glasses and she cleared her throat, trying to think of a reason-

“Picnic, then? Your boyfriend coming along?”

She laughed. “Oh, no. No boyfriend.”

“Good.”

She raised her eyebrows at him, ignoring the flutter she felt. He went red. “I, ah, just meant, it’s a lovely- well.”

She smiled at him. He smiled back. “I have my own lunch, if I might join you.”

She couldn’t stop blushing, but she managed a nod.

~

“You were right. I am a Professor.”

She had known she was right. Of course she was- his blazer had elbow patches. It was nice to hear it, though. “Yeah? What do you teach?”

“Paranormal studies.”

She paused, apple slice halfway to her mouth. “What’s that?”

He wobbled his eyebrows at her. “Paranormal studies. Ghosts and the like. Phenomena.”

“That’s not a real subject area.”

“Oh, but it is, Rose Tyler.”

She liked the way he said her name, like she was someone important. “So you’re a ghostbuster, yeah?”

“I’m offended. At least put me in the Scooby gang.”

“Men in masks, then.”

“No. Fake mediums with cheesecloths in their orifices.”

She wrinkled her nose at him, and he barked out a laugh. He bounded to his feet.

“I have to take my leave, Miss Tyler. Have a meeting soon.”

She resisted the urge to pout. “Well, Professor. ‘m glad you shared my lunch, even if you’re leaving me hanging on the conversation.

He rubbed the back of his head. “I, ah, might be able to finish sometime. Perhaps, at dinner. If you were so inclined.

She felt the grin break over her face. “I’d like that.”

~

Dinner doesn’t happen, but for some reason, she’s neither surprised nor disappointed. Her week passes in the same excruciating monotony and Saturday finds her retracing her usual path with the same picnic basket in hand, going towards her steps.

And there he is, sitting on his step, book in hand. He scrambles to his feet.

“Miss Tyler.”

“Professor.”

He offers his hand to her, wiggling her fingers. With a laugh, she takes it, and they climb up their stairs to their patch of grass.

~

Wednesdays are the worst day.

It feels purposeful, the monotony. She clocks in. Whichever other girl was assigned to her doesn’t show, but it does not really matter because virtually no one walks into the shop. She isn’t allowed a book and so she sits, listening to the wordless music her boss blasts through the aisles, and wishes desperately that she be allowed to cry.

She never does, and she goes home feeling horribly full of something she can never fix.

~

Abruptly, he stops having meetings on Saturdays. His reason to leave her has disappeared.

She doesn’t want to ask him about it. Doesn’t want to change the spell that seems to weave over their steps, where anything can happen- although not much does, really, when she thinks about it. They eat together and talk and it’s wonderful and it’s rapidly becoming the highlight of her existence, but nothing really happens.

The only thing significant about it, she thinks, is that she can’t think about it during the rest of the week. John blurs into the background of the monotony.

She’s only allowed to have so much of him, after all.

~

Thursdays are always the same.

They always are one or two girls over scheduled and so she has time for a full lunch break. The girls are vapid, awful creatures and for the thousandth time she wonders why she doesn’t just quit and find somewhere else to work.

She goes to her favorite chippie. She usually doesn’t have time for it, but Thursdays allow her.

Once she’s at home she gets horrible food poisoning. It’s a mockery of what she used to inflict on herself and she cries, miserable from the bile in her throat, and swears off the fish.

Next week, it will happen again.

~

“D’ya think this has happened before?”

She frowns at him over her apple slice. “What? Y’mean how we always eat the same things on Saturday?”

He shakes his head. “I don’t know. Us. Do you think we’ve happened before?”

She can’t help the smile. “I didn’t pin you as much of a romantic.”

“Not what I mean. I mean the deja vu. I mean, that cloud there.”

“The cloud?”

“Yes.” He rolls back on his elbows and tugs her along with him. “That cloud. It’s not that it’s shaped like anything in particular, it’s that it’s the same shape, and it drifts over us every Saturday at this particular time.”

“I don’t understand.”

“I don’t either. That’s the problem.”

She tucks her head against his shoulder. It still makes her heart pound, that she’s allowed to do that. She sighs. “Can we talk about it tomorrow?”

“I’ll call you.”

She shakes her head against him. “No, you won’t.”

“You’re right. I won’t, no matter how much I want to.”

And he doesn’t.

~

Monday.

There is a customer with a sick child. The baby wails his way to the store and Rose silently wishes the day will end.

It does, and she realizes she has no real recollection of anything else that happened.

The rest of the week happens. And she doesn’t want to look too closely.

~

He tries to make her listen.

He plots out his week for her. He trips in the same place every Tuesday at 2. He is dressed down by his superiors for losing a student’s major paper on Wednesdays at 10. Thursday, he forgets his lunch and passes out mid-lecture, and wakes up to the laughter of his students.

He can never call her, no matter how hard he tries.

“You’re wrong, John. We have Saturdays.”

He understands that she doesn’t want to see. He kisses her instead.

~

She stares at her calender and realizes that she has no idea how many weeks have passed.

She used to mark the days with slashes, but she doesn’t know when the last time she did it was. Was it Mum’s birthday today, or a month ago? How long has it been since Mickey called?

She has no idea when it was that John kissed her the first time, and her stomach turns. But it’s Wednesday, and she has to get to work.

~

He won’t just sit with her. She doesn’t want to figure it out, and he won’t just sit.

“Rose, don’t you ever notice that your life is the same thing every week? Not metaphorically speaking, literally the same. Sunday through Friday.”

She shakes her head, hard. “No. No, you’re wrong. We have Saturdays, John.”

“Yes, but we can only meet on those bloody steps!” He’s gripping his hair, pacing, thinking out loud. “Everything is the same. Same lesson plans. Same questions. Same walk home. I think to call you, and I can’t. I go to take my cell phone out of my pocket, and suddenly I’m home and I don’t know if I’ve called or not. I only see you Saturday, that’s all we-”

She stands, grabs his shirtsleeve, gets ready to beg- oh. “John.”

She’s staring at his wrists. How has she never seen it?

“What? What is it, love?”

He always wears long sleeves. She cups his left hand in hers and studies it, studies the long, faded scar that drags down his forearm.

“Rose.” She can hear the pain in his voice, can sense that he’s not ready to talk about it. Instead of speaking, she drops his hand and pulls the leather cuff she always wears from her own wrist.

Matching scars.

He trembles. She can see the shaking, starting low on his spine and spreading over his body.

“Rose. God.”

She can feel the tears prickling at her eyelids. “We match, love.”

Tenderly, he lifts her hand to his mouth and kisses her scar.

She can’t ignore it anymore.

She’s shaking. She can’t help it. Her knees give. He catches her, and suddenly he’s everywhere, lips and teeth and tongue against hers and she pulls him closer, desperate for him.

“Please-”

“Need you-”

And she falls.

~

Sunday.

She wakes up in her own bed. She knows she didn’t fall asleep there, but she’s stopped questioning it. She dresses, goes to work, gets through the day. Goes home.

She doesn’t get a call from John. She doesn’t know if she should expect one.

She’s learning. It’s Sunday.

~

Monday.

The same child. The same wailing.

Tuesday. Wednesday.

This is monotony. This is the same. How had she never noticed?

She falls asleep clutching the phone. She dialed the same number over and over, and it never patched through.

~

Thursday.

She makes a conscious effort to go to another chippie for lunch. The road loops back, and she has to think about it, over and over, to remember it happening.

She still ends up kneeling into front of her toilet. She presses her face to the side of the cold porcelain, and she cries and cries, because she can’t change it.

~

Friday.

She decides to call out sick. And an hour later, she’s on the shop floor.

~

 

Saturday.

She knows it will be different.

She calls out of work. Is able to, this time. She wants to go to John’s flat, but her feet carry her to the steps. She doesn’t question it.

The worlds are closer here.

She sees him, sitting sprawled the same way he was that first day. He smiles broadly when he sees her, and before she knows it she’s swept up in his arms.

She wonders how long she’ll be allowed to have him.

They end up curled up together in the grass at the top of the steps. They know they won’t be disturbed. Not here.

He’s studying her scar. “You think we did it at the same time?”

She shrugs. “I don’t know. I can’t remember how long I’ve been here, really.”

He presses his lips to the raised skin. “I don’t know how I feel anymore. Six days a week, I’m in...but Saturdays, I have you.”

“Try not to enjoy it too much. We’ll get it taken away.”

He chuckles darkly, and pulls her into his lap. “‘s too late. I’ve had you now. Even if they took you away, I’d still have you in my mind.”

She cries at that, and clings to him. He clings back.

Once a week, they have each other. They must have done something right.


End file.
